The post-hype prospect enjoying a long-awaited breakout

The top end of the Angels roster looks a bit different than it has in recent years.

Shohei Ohtani (now with the Dodgers) and Mike Trout (currently on the injured list after undergoing knee surgery) were the clear stars on the roster for so long, and a void exists without those two players suiting up for the Angels. While it was expected that young players such as Logan O’Hoppe, Zach Neto and Nolan Schanuel might help fill that hole, it’s another former top prospect who’s shown signs of achieving stardom.

Jo Adell entered the 2020 season as MLB Pipeline’s No. 6 overall prospect and was widely expected to be a building block for the Angels organization after being the 10th overall pick in the 2017 Draft. But Adell scuffled across his first four MLB seasons, with a .214/.259/.366 line and a 71 OPS+ that was a bottom-20 figure among players with at least 500 plate appearances in that time. However, those numbers came in only 178 total games, as the Angels optioned Adell back to Triple-A six times after his initial call-up, to go along with multiple stints on the injured list.

Entering the 2024 season as a classic post-hype prospect, Adell has authored the sort of hot start that shows why he received such acclaim in the first place. The 25-year-old is hitting .248/.304/.505 with seven home runs and a 125 OPS+ that ranks third on the Angels (min. 75 plate appearances) behind Trout (141) and Luis Rengifo (137). Adell’s progress has been a welcomed development both for an Angels team that needs it and a player who really struggled in his initial MLB time.

“I think having Ron [Washington] here and the coaching staff [has helped]. They’ve made it more about the work and focusing on the day-to-day process of what we are trying to do,” Adell said about what’s changed this season. “I think when the focus gets off the work and about the results, things can go sideways. I think we’ve done a good job with the focus being on the approach, what the plan is and getting out on the field to just be able to work every day. Being a part of the game on an everyday basis has allowed me to find a little bit of that comfort.”

You can see Adell’s improvements just from a look at his raw stats -- his OPS this season is nearly 200 points higher than his career OPS -- but what stands out even more is Adell’s underlying Statcast metrics.

Expected Weighted On-base Average is an all-encompassing statistic that looks at both quality and quantity of contact. Basically, how well are you hitting the baseball and how often are you doing so. So far, Adell is rocking a .389 xwOBA that is tied for the 15th-best mark among all hitters, around names such as Freddie Freeman, Fernando Tatis Jr. and Christian Walker.

A lot of that is due to Adell’s prodigious power -- we’ll touch on that in a bit -- but the most notable improvement to spark this production has been his ability to make more contact. Adell carried a career 35.4 percent strikeout rate and 36.2 percent whiff rate into the season, two figures that would hold back any player, regardless of the rest of their skills.

Suffice to say, Adell has drastically improved in that area, as he’s shaved his strikeout rate to 24.8 percent. If he was a qualifying hitter, Adell’s 15.5 percentage-point drop in strikeout rate would be the largest drop, as would his 11.6 percent drop in whiff rate.

Adell credited his experience and learning the difference between perceived strengths and actual strengths as a hitter and coming into the season with a different approach.

“I think it’s a combination of a lot of things coming together. For me, it’s about recognizing what I hit well and that kind of takes a while,” Adell said about his contact improvements. “There’s the visual of what you think you hit versus what you actually hit, according to the numbers and how you’re looking.”

Adell’s overall swing percentage is about two points below his career mark this year, and he’s running a career-low 30.9 percent chase rate. Those changes have been most notable against offspeed pitches -- a pitch group he’s swung at roughly 20 percent less often this season compared to last year. As someone who had a career .483 OPS and 43.2 percent whiff rate against those pitches before this season, that was a sound adjustment.

It’s not just a matter of swinging less against offspeed pitches, though. Adell is making more contact and producing better results against all pitches as a whole.

Adell’s numbers against pitch groups, 2020-23 vs. 2024
Fastballs: .660 OPS, 35.2 whiff% // .803 OPS, 24.1 whiff%
Breaking balls: .607 OPS, 35.8 whiff% // .735 OPS, 33.8 whiff%
Offspeed pitches: .483 OPS, 43.2 whiff% // 1.064 OPS, 22.2 whiff%

The ability to make more contact is abundantly clear, but Adell has also tapped into his raw power much more frequently this season. Adell is running a career-best barrel rate (14.7 percent), hard-hit rate (45.3 percent) and sweet-spot rate (37.3 percent).

Oftentimes, there is a push-pull relationship between trying to make more contact and maintaining your current power level. The fact that Adell has managed to improve in both areas is impressive.

“It’s that conscious decision at the plate that if I’m looking in a certain area, looking for a certain pitch to do damage in a certain spot, I’m still letting my A swing get off,” Adell said about balancing this relationship. “I’m just not overly committed to swinging just to swing. When I let that A swing off and I’m wrong, I’m wrong. Sometimes, if it’s a slider away and I decide to swing, I’m going to swing and put something behind it.”

When it comes to A swings, very few hitters are letting it rip as fast as Adell is this season. If you haven’t seen, Statcast unveiled publicly-available bat tracking statistics this week. One of the most noteworthy and easy-to-grasp metrics released was a hitter’s bat speed. The top of that leaderboard is exactly who you’d expected: Giancarlo Stanton, Oneil Cruz and Kyle Schwarber are the first three hitters, while Aaron Judge, Juan Soto and Yordan Alvarez are just below them.

Also included in the top 10 is Adell, who is averaging 76.4 mph on his swing -- well above the average 72.0 mph swing. While these metrics are publicly available for the first time, they’re certainly not on the team side, so Adell is well aware that he possesses elite bat speed.

“I have [seen those numbers]. I’m pretty aware that when I swing, I’m not getting cheated on it. The numbers show what that is,” Adell said. “But I think more so than that, when I’ve gotten my A swing off, I’ve been able to do damage with it. I think that’s the most important thing here -- the ability to pick those pitches out and then put that swing on.”

While top-tier bat speed isn’t a guarantee of success, it certainly gives Adell an advantage over most hitters. It also helps that Adell has turned 11.6 percent of his swings into blasts -- essentially batted balls that are squared up and come on a fast swing -- which is above the league-average 10.6 percent mark.

Combine all these elements, and you have a hitter who is growing into his own in his fifth big-league season. It took Adell some time to get to this point, but the early signs are encouraging enough to believe the long-awaited breakout is here.